


the ten duel commandments

by deltacrow



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh!, Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's, Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V, Yu-Gi-Oh! GX, Yu-Gi-Oh! Series, Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal
Genre: (sort of), Gen, Sens8 fusion, mixed english & japanese names, no beta we die like real men
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-15
Updated: 2017-07-12
Packaged: 2018-11-14 15:33:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 7,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11210985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deltacrow/pseuds/deltacrow
Summary: the Visitor-verse AU of the Yu-Gi-Oh! franchise, ft. everyone's favorite second-banana protagonists.(well, my favorite second-banana protagonists.)





	1. prologue: do not throw away your shot

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Visitors](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4515243) by [Riona](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Riona/pseuds/Riona). 



> the Visitor-verse is an Assassin's Creed/Sens8 fusion feat. Desmond & his ancestors as a time-travelling cluster. It's pretty wild, but I followed it from the beginning for a while until school swamped me. So, naturally, I decided to write a version of it for Yu-Gi-Oh, because WOW am I slut for yugioh and time travel.
> 
> titles taken from Ten Duel Commandments from Hamilton

Ushio catches Joey one last time and knocks him back into the wall. His ears ring, his hair is starting to stick to his skin from sweat and congealing blood, and the pointed aches all over his body burn. Keeping his eyes open is impossible with sudden swelling and, worse, makes his new headache worse.

 

The feeling of rough brick at his back disappears, replaced with something cool and slippery. The air smells like electricity and hot copper for less than a second. Half a beat passes before someone screams.

 

\--- ---

 

Yuzu screams when she looks into the bathroom mirror to find a blond teenager bleeding behind her.

 

Her dad screams for her from the floor below her, and the teen yells from behind her, a burst of adrenaline probably giving him the strength to throw one last punch before he collapses. He misses and stumbles into the sink, and he disappears suddenly before her father, thumping against the door, demands to know what’s going on in there. “Are there spiders? Is it mice? _Is there a pervert outside?_ ” He demands.

 

Yuzu slumps against the wall next to the bathtub and lies, voice strained and high-pitched, “I-- a spider. It-- it was a spider and it caught me off-guard.”

 

Her father calms down and stops banging on the door. “You kill it?” He asks, and she hears his back thump against a wall, and the the _ssssh-tmp_ of him sliding down to sit on the floor outside of the bathroom.

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Atta girl.” They sit there in silence for a few minutes before Yuzu gathers herself, and leaves the bathroom. Her father says nothing about the boy yelling, only puts his hand on her shoulder and shepherds her to her door, but Yuzu doesn’t think of that for at least another week.

 

\--- ---

 

Joey wakes up from the weird hallucination he had, of being in a young girl’s bathroom and nearly punching her in a frenzied panic, to the fluorescence of the nurse’s office and a nasty throbbing in his everywhere. No, really, everywhere hurt, and it’s terrible-- that asshole Ushio really knows how to fuck a dude up.

 

Hallucinations, though, that’s new-- he might want to look up what concussions do, because anything else means he’s a nutcase. He sits up and immediately gets accosted by four- something feet of what appears to be a human bandage-- wait, no, that’s Yuugi Motou. What’s he doing here?

 

“You’re awake! Thank goodness, the nurse is about to leave--”

 

“Slow down, man; what happened? What-- what’s going on?”  Joey gently pries Yuugi off of himself, wincing as his muscles scream in agony.

 

“You-- You fell asleep,” Yuugi says quietly, “Tristan had to help me carry you to the nurse, after Ushio beat us all up.”

 

Joey’s stomach flip-flops unpleasantly at that. He’s from _Rintama_ , for fuck’s sake; he should be able to take more than a few punches and still be able to dish out some pain. Instead, he got thrown around like a ragdoll. The worst part is, Yuugi Motou finally grows a pair, and it’s all because Joey wasn’t strong enough to protect himself and Tristan. Yuugi Mouto has shown that he is a better person than Joey could ever be, and there Joey was, bullying him to tears.

 

Great, now he feels like an asshole. He’s gonna have to make up for that forever, now, won’t he? Maybe if he apologizes, Yuugi will call them even?

 

\--- ---

 

Yuugi never does call them even. That’s okay, though, Joey thinks, because he’s got another way to make them straight. So he fishes the last piece of that puzzle out of the school pool, and delivers it, sopping wet, to the Kame Game Shop. He’s got no idea how he finds it, in the fading light and murky water, and he’s got no idea _why_ this kid is so enamored with it, but. They’re square now. Maybe.

 

It helps keep his mind off of that weird goddamn dream, where he showed up in some girl’s bathroom. To be honest, he’s worried about himself now: that girl was too young, even for him, and he’s pretty sure he’s never wanted to inspire bone-deep terror in a girl before. Well, maybe in _some_ girls, sure, but she didn’t really look the type to cut him from chin to dick. There are some lines he doesn’t cross.

 

He climbs up the fire escape of his apartment building, slipping on the landing and sliding inside to change and hang up his uniform to dry before the next day, hopefully. He’s got his shirt off and his pants unbuttoned before a bright voice announces, “I’ve never seen a mess this big inside without a ceiling caving in on me!”

 

\--- ---

 

Crow’s got to hand it to the dude he’s just woken up to: his mess is organized, and everything that he’d need to leave with is basically within reaching distance of the window. Normally, this is where Crow would pocket anything he could get his hands on and sell reliably later, but something in him recoils from robbing the man blind, though, and he’s learned to trust his instincts in these sorts of situations: what else would have gotten him out of Team Satisfaction before it all blew up the way it did?

 

So he decides to show this person-- tugging their shirt off and hanging it on a hook, wow, where’d they find such nice stuff?-- that they could have made a terrible decision by letting him in. Not that Crow doesn’t appreciate it, but being nice is a really _terrible_ idea. He would have thought the markers would have given that away, to be honest.

 

Blondie-- Jesus, this is a _kid_ , someone needs to tell Jack he’s got family around, Blondie is so _tall_ \-- swings around, arms akimbo, and nearly backhands Crow. They stare at each other before everything slips away from Crow, shattering into a billion tiny pixels like a duel disk projection.

 

When he wakes up later, head pounding, he nearly kids himself into thinking he was at Blondie’s place. But he's still in the B.A.D. District, and he’s still fresh out of Team Satisfaction, for all his sins. It was a strange dream, sure. But he's had worse.

 

\--- ---


	2. 1: the challenge/demands satisfaction

\--- ---

 

A couple weeks pass without so much as a whisper from the dude with tattoos, and just when Joey feels like maybe this will get back to normal, Yuugi takes that dick Kaiba down a couple of pegs, and then.

 

And then. Duelist Kingdom is announced.

 

Duelist Kingdom is Yuugi's  _ only  _ hope for his grandpa. Duelist Kingdom is Joey’s last hope for his sister and her eyes. That stupid video, that  _ fucking  _ ultimatum-- lookit, the Mutt has some big goddamn words, Kaiba-- has been rattling around in Joey’s skull for the past two days. It’s pressed against his head when he’s stacking crates in the storerooms of local bars and Gramp Muto’s shop; it whispers in his ears during class. He’s sick of it, of everything closing in on him.

 

When Yuugi offers Joey the card, offers him the star chip, he’s never been more thankful for this pushy kid and his friendship. Joey decides, then and there, that Yuugi’s gonna go a hell of a lot farther than he will; if Yuugi won’t ask for a boost, Joey will just have to force himself under Yuugi’s feet and boost him somewhere brighter by force.

 

He’d like to know that Yuugi’s got as much  _ sane  _ support as possible, though, and Joey’s not sure anymore if he counts.

 

“I  _ told  _ you,” the ghost from a few weeks ago hollers from the deck of the ship. “I’ve seen sneaks like him-- he was gonna do something shady as hell!”

 

_ Shuddup, _ Joey’d like to growl at the spiky-haired menace. He just fucking  _ showed up _ , and nobody’s noticed him. That tattooed asshole started making him feel like a loon, poking at Joey and making faces at the guards. Is this a joke? Is he, like, a plant of Pegasus’? ( _ Can _ Pegasus control the dead? He steals souls just fine, apparently, and isn't  _ that  _ a pleasant thought.) Because  _ there’s  _ a guy who’s a shady bastard, and shady bastards seem to roll together. First Pegasus, then Weevil, now  _ this guy _ .

 

Joey only manages to find three cards.  _ Fuck _ . There goes Yuugi’s rabbit from his hat. But the other two are lost to the sea, and Joey can feel Yuugi catching his death out here, and if they dally any longer, they won’t be able to get back on the ship--

 

_ What kind of friend  _ is _ he, _ Joey thinks viciously, as he paddles to the rope ladder Tristan, bless him, throws over the side.

 

When they make it up, the ghost bastard slaps Joey on the back, and Joey lets out a startled cough when that slap connects. The tattooed loudmouth jumps back comically in shock. “What the  _ fuck--” _

 

Tristan starts tugging on Joey’s jacket. “You musta just swallowed some seawater, idiot,” he scoffs. “Toughen up, man!”

 

“I’d like to see you choke to death in there, you tool-- and it wasn’t seawater--” That dick is gone. What the fuck? Where’d he go?

 

“Whatever, man; we need to get outta sight before the guards show up. You okay with Yuugi?”

 

“Scram, bro. I got this.” Yuugi weighs as much as anyone would think: nothing at all. So it stands to reason, then, a sopping wet Yuugi would only weigh a little less than nothing. “We gotta get back soon, too-- you good for the night?”

 

“Scram, bro,” Tristan mocks. “I got this.”

 

Good to know, even with hallucinations or whatever, Joey’s still got a man in his corner.

 

\--- ---

 

Beating Mai with his own strength, beating Rex right when it looked bleak-- that was great, don’t get him wrong, but doing it while he worries about ghost hallucinations is not only putting a damper on everything, it’s also making him paranoid as hell. So he’s been waiting forever for the orange dude to show up again. He’s just not expecting it right after he goes to take a shit in the woods.

 

He’s also not expecting to get jumped by a bunch of thugs. Unfortunately, it still happens from time to time, and he can get behind that. 

 

Waking up  _ outside his goddamn body _ , though, is really new and  _ really  _ unappreciated.

 

“What the  _ fuck _ ,” he screeches. “Who the  _ fuck  _ are you.”

 

His body stiffens slightly and taps his nose. He’s never had a tic like that before. Joey is starting to get really fucking creeped out,  _ Jesus _ , he needs so much goddamn therapy, and possibly is dead or dying. Because he is watching his body duel in a graveyard against a creepy zombie kid and his weird and creepy partners, and these are just every single one of his card-game nightmares come to life. He hates his life.

 

“That’s all you’ve got, isn’t it,” his body yawns. “This is all very underwhelming, I’ll be honest.” His body draws a card-- the zombie kid has managed to get a  _ shit ton _ of zombies on the field, oh god, those are some  _ seriously  _ good graphics. Maybe if he focuses on just the quality of the graphics, he can-- no, this is a nightmare no matter how he puts it. “I cannot believe this tournament was so rife with amateurs and cheats. Call of the Haunted doesn’t even  _ do _ that.”

 

Joey thought that the Zombie Kid’s card effect sounded legit, though, if horrifying. What's worse is that Joey’s body,  _ lazily,  _ counteracts Call of the Haunted with some weird trap card that sounds even  _ more _ terrifying. “With this, I can remove from play five Fiend-type monsters from play from my Graveyard and summon Red Ogre from my hand or deck,” his body comments, completely unaware of the horrified stares or incoherent spluttering from literally every other person in this cave.

 

The zombies on the creepy kid's side of the field shatter into pieces, and a  _ behemoth _ rises out of nowhere, breathing steam and brandishing a club the size of the goddamn duel field. When the massive demon smashes through Zombie Kid’s life points, the smug asshole in the gaudy flag bandana leans in, hands white-knuckling the stone ledge he's sitting on.

 

\--- ---

 

Joey’s body has won a duel with cards he doesn’t even own, and Joey follows them out, knowing this is a dream. Is this Pegasus's doing? Joey would bet money on it. He has maybe some pocket change in his jacket, but he'd bet real money on this being Pegasus's fault. Spooky mumbo-jumbo tends to be, nowadays.

 

When his body follows sedately behind the three men and the kid-- the gaudy one is the ringleader here, posturing and prowling like nobody's business-- Joey follows. When the end of the tunnel is in sight, his body makes a break for it, Joey careening behind like a fish on a hook.

 

“I’ve never been fond of dueling and dashing, if you will,” Joey’s body pants. “But you seem to have enough stamina for it.” He does the nose-tapping thing again, and from up  _ close _ , that's more than weird, it's fucking unnatural. “Do you know why I have my deck here, or are you equally as lost?”

 

“What the  _ fuck  _ are you doing in my  _ body _ ,” Joey spits. “Get out! Get out of there!”

 

“Don't be crass; I didn't ask for my day to be disrupted like this either--”

 

And just like that, it's over-- Joey snaps back into his own body with a startled yelp and hears it echo before his ears ring in the abrupt silence.

 

It's the weirdest fucking lucid dream Joey's had ever. God, he hopes it's a dream. This is like that dream with Bakura and two Yuugis all over again.


	3. 2: your lieutenant/when theres reckoning to be reckoned

\--- ---

 

It takes Bastion a minute to realize that the girl reading over his shoulder does not, in fact, belong to Duel Academy. When he opens his mouth to request that she either ask for the book (on Fusion Summoning methods and their anthropological roots, referenced reading for an Advanced Special Summoning elective in his Junior year-- one can never be too careful with class registration and material) or find something he’s  _ not reading _ , she reaches over his shoulder to turn the page.

 

Nothing happens.

 

There's not even a breeze to lift the corner. She-- her immaculately done hair, her pink skirt and determined pout-- cannot interact with the things around  _ him _ . This suggests he is either hallucinating-- unlikely, he’s gotten ample sleep and remembered to set alarms for food breaks today-- or she is some sort of spirit. He would sniff disdainfully at that, but he did almost get murdered (in a world that definitely had three suns) by a Tombkeeper-archetype monster. That has, unfortunately, seemed to have thrown him into a constant state of suspension of disbelief. So instead, he sets the book on the table in front of him and turns the page.

 

\--- ---

 

The girl has not left his vicinity, and she has neither spoken nor been spoken to. Instead, she points to the corner of a page, and lets Bastion read at his leisure. She hums under her breath as she reads. 

 

It's rather pleasant, all things considered. He has inferred, by her silence, either a silent agreement not to speak in a library or mutism of some sort. He would like to think the former, because he is  _ itching _ to ask her about why she is here, and language-- in any form, really-- has never really been his strong suit.

 

His PDA pings-- Syrus wants help in Basic Deck Building Theory, probably in anticipation of Dr. Crowler’s next practical exam.

 

 

The girl has disappeared, which is a shame. He would have liked to question her. But in the book they shared, a scrap of paper sits, wrinkled and wedged in between the pages. It's a math worksheet-- it looks like algebra, with the name “Mizuki Kotori” printed on top. This puts her anywhere between a precocious twelve to around fifteen, he supposes.

 

Some of her answers are wrong. He may as well correct the work; after all, he blocked time to get some answers out of her. It's only fair he give some back.

 

\--- ---

 

Kotori huffs when she can't find her math worksheet a few hours later. She emails her teacher, and closes her email app. This is normally the time that Yuuma calls up, demands either a duel or help on his homework-- his “kattobingu” attitude normally wouldn't apply to math or history, but it's near the end of the marking period and  _ something's _ gotta keep him from failing-- but lately he's been going off, talking to nothing and leaving her behind.

 

She stretches and sighs. It's weird, honestly-- she's back at her desk and her mom was still in the middle of calling her for dinner when she found herself in a  _ library _ , of all places. She hasn't been in a library in years, she thinks, and then she just.  _ Jumps _ to one _. _ (She'd think it a dream of she could just find her damn homework. But her homework is missing and she woke up from it with her mother still mid-sentence.)

 

“On my way, Mom,” she calls, tipping her chair back. “Just need to... Finish something for class!”

 

She pulls the internet back up and searches “fusion summon history + culture” and leaves it for after dinner. She'd like to have some questions for that boy, if she ever seems him again.

 

She has a feeling she might.

 

\--- ---

 

Bastion calls it a loss and moves on. Well, it’s inaccurate to say he  _ moves on _ insomuch as he forgets entirely about the matter at hand, what with the end of term and the Legendary Beast cards.

 

It’s when the semester ends that Bastion finds the notes to Kotori in his notebook. He’s at home, lounging on tile floor, when the thought comes to him: never mind how she got there- he has a feeling he can find  _ something _ in the fuzzier maths. The question becomes not  _ how _ but  _ why _ , then; maybe not  _ why him _ or  _ why her _ but  _ why now _ and  _ why here _ . This is more philosophical than Bastion prefers, perhaps, but nothing he can’t rationalize, he thinks.

 

He decides that perhaps looking over some of Kaku’s work, for all that it's incomprehensible to him about a quarter of the time, it may at least shed light on what questions he should be asking himself when his head throbs. When he tries to lift a hand to rub his head, he realizes that he’s no longer at home (he's in a  _ cave,  _ what in the world is he leaning against?) and that he’s wearing pants and--

 

“Green has never been my colour,  _ ugh,”  _ he sneers, fingering the sleeves of a jacket. Bastion’s given maybe a second and a half to digest his new accent and sartorial choices before a small child in terrible zombie makeup demands a duel.

 

Well,  _ si fueris Rōmae _ and all that. Who knows, he might be able to get some good data from this.

 

\--- --- 


	4. 3: negotiate a peace/or negotiate a time and place

Kotori does not duel. She goes to public school, and yes, she has a deck, because at this point it's basic social etiquette-- but she does not  _ duel _ . She does not aspire to dueling legend, she only knows the rules through peer pressure and osmosis, and she is vaguely embarrassed to be seen near Yuuma when he gets into a mood-- not because he's  _ bad  _ at it _ ,  _ that would be hypocritical of her, but because his enthusiasm makes her want to bury her face in her hands and sigh.

 

She finds herself very confused, then, when she sees the same boy from a few days ago, reciting the various types of spell cards from memory, in a sea of other people her age that are studiously taking notes on what's coming out of his mouth.

 

When he sits down and adjusts his posture in the lecture hall (!), his eyes roam from his notebook to the lectern, and then he glazes over when her sees her: eight feet away and awkwardly pulling out her D-Pad to record this, on the off-chance she can prove that she's not insane.

 

She sweeps her D-Pad camera over the crowd of students and settles on the board. Why does everyone around her seem to be obsessed with dueling? It's frankly weird.

 

The professor behind the podium had nodded and thanked a Mr. Misawa for his answer and almost immediately afterward called out a boy in a red jacket for-- is he sleeping? He  _ is _ ! Kotori stifles a giggle. He's like Yuuma, only she's sure Yuuma would  _ try _ to stay awake here.

 

“Even you Slifer slackers must be aware,” he admonishes. “Mastery cannot be achieved without dedication and a solid foundation in basic theory!” 

 

The lecture feels like it goes on forever. The man behind the podium whips around, caustic and sharp, picking on students and calling them names when their attention slips. She expects his ponytail to crack the air every time he zeros in on someone.

 

For all that, though, he does speak well, and she begrudgingly learns something about Duel Theory. Apparently as the game has evolved, and continues to evolve, card developers borrow old myths and legends for both new cards and new rules. 

 

“There is a reading due for next class, consult the syllabus on page numbers! If I see any  _ one _ of you cretins in my office, there  _ will  _ be a reading quiz!” Papers shuffle and noise erupts from the students. Misawa tears a few pages out of his notebook and pulls out a highlighter, resting a hand suspiciously on an empty seat next to him.

 

It looks like an invitation.

 

\--- ---

 

One of the pages under Bastion's notes is the girl's Algebra homework. Frankly, that kind of math has been below him for years, but it’s always good to refresh the basics; he would have to declare a concentration in CompSci or some sort of Engineering if he wanted to do anything math-heavy later on, and the only way he’s going to be able to apply Duel Academia classes and dueling in general to those is if he pushes for a job in Kaiba Corp or I 2 . It's something to consider, certainly, but there's a more pressing issue. Namely, this Kotori girl and how  _ nobody else has noticed her.  _ She showed up in the middle of his lecture, out of nowhere, and if nothing else, he would have expected Professor Crowler to make an example out of her if she was actually a student: he’s done that a few times, notably to Jaden, as punishment for being late and getting caught.

 

Nobody even looks her way. It’s unnerving. 

 

**_What are you_ ** , he writes, and pushes the worksheet towards her.

 

“I'm certain I'm a person, but I’m not sure about  _ you _ ,” she replies, and thanks him for correcting her homework. “It was due a few hours ago, but I appreciate the thought.” She smooths out her skirt. “Ah, that’s how number 4 was supposed to go!”

 

She folds up the paper neatly, before sighing and folding it further. “My name is Kotori Mizuki. May I have yours?”

 

He taps the name in the corner of his notes,  **_Bastion Misawa_ ** , and highlights another key point in the assigned reading.

 

She nods, absently folding a thinner and thinner paper airplane. She gathers her things into her lap, and sticks the paper into her hair as a delicate ornament; he’s about to ask about  _ why _ she’s here when she cuts out abruptly, disappearing with as much forewarning as she appeared with.

 

He gathers his things and sighs. Between his homework and his other studies, he needs to find time to make a written list of questions for her.

 

\--- ---

 

Kotori walks out of a dressing room and onto a conveyor belt platform over a massive chasm. She and the blonde man next to her nearly fall off the walkway in shock, barely catching themselves.

 

Someone from the other side of the chasm calls out. “There a problem, Wheeler?” The smirk on his face is audible.

 

“Jus’ fuckin’  _ fine _ ,  _ Bandit Keith! _ ” the man she’s visiting shouts back.

 

When they stop at a massive table thing, Kotori scrambles to the platform and leans against the side. It’ll be a tight fit, for certain, but it beats falling into an abyss--

 

“Are we  _ inside _ ?”

 

“How the  _ fuck _ did you get here?”

 

“Who has a  _ bottomless pit _ in their own house?”


	5. 4.1 you pay him in advance, treat 'em with civility

Yuzu takes a breath and draws a card. Regardless of who that guy was—the one that called her a different name, that looked like Yuuya, was clearly  _ not _ —she needs to win this. She needs to win this duel, big time, so her father’s livelihood doesn’t get steamrolled over by those conceited, LDS snobs.

She’s just got to calm down, breathe, and—

“Bastion, what are you  _ doing? _ ” Who—she mentally runs through everyone she knows is there; Yuuya, Gongenzaka, her dad—yeah, no, there’s no one who’s name even remotely sounds like Bastion nearby. What’s even going on here?

She opens her eyes to a colosseum and a buff woman with scars on her face is in Masumi’s place.

“Draw a card, child,” the woman purrs. “so I can end you and gain your key quickly.”

“The hell is wrong with you, Misawa,” someone screams from the sidelines. “Don’t tell me you were all talk there! Step aside and  _ I’ll  _ take her down then!”

This is the weirdest thing Yuzu’s ever had to deal with. Maybe that’s just the action field though? She can’t think of a time when the holograms heckled at her, though. She can work with this, though. Probably.

\--- ---

Bastion’s not entirely sure what’s happening anymore with this whole...  _ visiting _ nonsense, but he’s loathe to repeat the experience of dueling as someone else. Which is of course when he substitutes in for a girl his age, and she’s not anywhere in sight.

A girl, also his age, smirks from the opposite end of the room, remarking on the “lackluster” shine in his eyes. Her eyes?

“Pronouns,” he mutters. Pesky buggers. So he had been tooling around with the chemistry deck this time, in preparation for the Shadow Riders; this could be a good test drive for it. Perhaps it came with him, like last time?

“You’ll never amount to anything with the flaws I can see in your dueling!”

This is-- “You haven’t even  _ seen _ my dueling,” Bastion guffaws. The  _ height _ of irony. This girl must be a friend of the girl he’s… borrowing. There’s no good way to phrase that, is there. “How  _ childish _ . I can’t wait to see what kind of holes I can poke in your strategies.”

\--- ---

What kind of weird action field is this? Yuzu’s certain she’s never actually changed looks like this. With her hair and complexion? There’s no  _ way _ she’d be caught wearing yellow. Also, there’s been no action cards, which is both stupid and unhelpful. None of the spectators fit the theme, and her new look doesn’t match it either—but she’s got a couple more things to worry about, like—

“Face it, cutie; with my Amazon Archer, Amazoness Swords Women  _ and _ my Paladin ready to tear into your life points, your choir’s about to change their tune!” She chuckles darkly, resting her hand on the hilt of her sword. “You’ve got a single face-down on the field!

Yuzu pants, eyes tearing to the sleeves of her jacket. No matter how hard she tries to dodge these attacks, some part of the field manages to ricochet and hit her. Worse has happened, sure, but she didn’t think she was  _ that  _ bad at dodging Solid Vision projections.

…It’s not like the peanut gallery has been any more helpful than Yuuya has ever been, and it hadn’t exactly taken her long to figure out what kind of deck this lady was using. Most duelists aren’t exactly subtle.

Now it’s a matter of clearing the field and smashing through her life points. Which could be unfortunate, considering she’s got about 1800 Life points left,  _ Beckoning Light _ face down and no way to summon any of the monsters in her hand. She’s probably done worse for herself.

What’s something pithy she can say here about Amazons? “You’ve been drinking too much jungle juice—there’s no way I’ll lose to you!” She grins as brightly as she can. It doesn’t feel as sunny as it normally does.


	6. 4.2 you have 'em turn around so he can have deniability

Nailed it.

These Action Cards have admittedly been an addition that threw him for a loop, but this just means that the Gem Knights in front of him aren’t balanced properly. They rely too much on luck of the draw, so to speak, with Action Cards, and her support cards are more specialized. He was even able to negate an attack to his person with one; while he’s perhaps not the pinnacle of health, the girl he’s been… inhabiting must be. (There still hasn’t been a good way to phrase this, and there hasn’t been a good way to explain the disorientation of looking down and not seeing himself.)

She also fuses excessively, like Jaden, and Bastion’s been cracking that code since his entrance duel. She’s not even _near_ his level.

Apparently, though, this was supposed to be a Fusion Summon duel. How upsetting, then; they’ll have to settle for covalent bonding.

“I’m afraid not even Brilliant Diamond can cut through this: I activate _A Hero Emerges!_ ” Jaden has a copy of this card already; Bastion had made a face about ruining the theme of his deck, but this is the perfect way to summon monsters on his opponent’s turn. “Normally, you would choose a card from my hand at random; if it was a monster, it would be summoned. If it was not, it would go to the graveyard. But…” He smirks, and shows off the Oxyggedon in his hand before summoning it quietly to the field. Oxyggedon screams to life, wind picking up loose mirror fragments around them.

“Tha— _that doesn’t matter,_ ” the girl proclaims. “By interrupting my attack, I’m allowed to re-choose my target! _I’ll still be taking down your Hydroggedon!_ ” As Brilliant Diamond rises for another assault, Bastion lazily flips up _Negate Attack_. Diamond rushes in on Hydroggedon, and her sword bounces off of a barrier, ending the Battle Phase with a dour look and the crackle of ozone, the smell of a storm.

“Well, I must admit, you’ve been a thoroughly dull opponent. This does not surprise me in the least.”

 _“Why haven’t you Fusion Summoned yet?_ Your _school_ is on the _line!”_

He reaches for his deck, drawing on his deck and his years spent as the biggest intellectual fish in the academic ocean. “I haven’t needed to. Why, should I have?” Perfect. It’s time to end this.

Different Dimension Capsule shatters to reveal the _Bonding- H2O_ card he had sealed away two turns ago. “As is, it’s useless—”

 

“Why go through the trouble then, if it’s so—”

“But when I activate _Call of the Haunted_ to bring back a second Hydroggedon, _well_ , that’s an entirely different story, then.”

Bastion sighs as Water Dragon forms, water snaking around him protectively, picking up more of the glass shrapnel. His deck auto-shuffles. “My final face-down card, _Burden of the Mighty_ , reduces the attack points of every monster on your field by 100 multiplied by the level of an individual monster. Brilliant Diamond loses 1000 attack points.”  He smiles. He feels like it’s not the nicest smile he’s managed today.

“Water Dragon attacks.”

\--- ---

This is probably the best outcome Yuzu could hope for! With 1st Movement Solo in her hand, Beckoning Light on the Field, and Soprano about to go to the Graveyard, Yuzu’s got this duel locked down. “I’ll play the Spell card _1_ _st_ _Movement Solo_! I’m able to Special Summon any Melodious monster from my hand of Deck to the field!” When the animation for the score opens, and the Amazonesses braced for battle, Yuzu takes in the field one last time and nods decisively. “The monster I chose is Serenade, the Melodious Diva! Center stage!”

Orange lace spirals outward from nowhere, unravelling to reveal a woman covered in pink and draped lavishly in orange ruffles. The score closes delicately. “This is the weirdest deck I’ve ever seen Bastion play,” one of the boys muses. Yuzu moves to flip them off, used to hearing Yuuya say those kinds of things, but a girl cuts her off with a stern “is that a comment on something? Besides, you can’t deny it’s effective, _Jaden_.” Huh, nice. Even the action field knows how tired she was getting of hearing that stuff.

“Because Serenade was Special Summoned, I’m allowed to Normal Summon a Melodious monster twice this turn! Not only that—” she grunts, pain in her shoulders flaring up.

“You alright, kitten?” her opponent leers at her. She’s been getting some pretty menacing vibes from this woman, and while the supporters are nice, if weird, she’s not entirely sure that even LDS thinks flirting with their opponents is kosher.

“Not _only that,_ ” Yuzu continues, valiantly ignoring both pain and the urge to stick out her tongue, she’s _not a child_ — “but Serenade counts as two Tributes if I Tribute Summon for a Fairy-type monster! Next,” oh, boy, she’s really starting to ache, “I’ll activate Beckoning Light! I discard my hand, and add the same number of Light-attribute monsters from my Graveyard to my hand!” She discards the other two cards in her hand. Time to make this count!

“I’ll bring Soprano— the Melodious Songstress back to my hand, and take Shopina—The Melodious Maestra to my hand! Then, I sacrifice Serenade to Summon the level 7 Fairy-type Shopina, and Normal Summon the level 4 Soprano!”

 

Light emerges through Serenade’s skin, cracking like porcelain; fairy lights twinkle from the monster’s shattered form, refitting to form Shopina. Soprano bursts into existence, a flare lighting in the darkest of nights.

One of the boy’s scoffs. “Big deal, brainiac’s got a couple new groupies in his band. Bet I could’ve ended this ages ago.”

“Gee, why don’t I _enlighten_ you, then!” Yuzu spins on her heel, and tries not to wince with the sudden movement. _Performance art, Yuzu. Performance art._ “Shopina lets me take a Light-attribute, Fairy-type monster from my grave and add it to my hand. When I do that, I get to—” _I get to— I get to—_

“You show remarkable resilience, Bastion, darling. I like that in a man.” Yuzu’s opponent bares her teeth. “Especially with all your jumping. But you’re finally starting to feel the effect of a real Shadow Game, aren’t you?”

“Huh,” she says faintly. “I might’ve read about this once.” She shakes her head, a headache beginning to pound behind her eyes. _Get it together_. _It’s Solid Vision; Shadow Games aren’t real._

“You’ve put up quite fight, but it’s not enough! Get ready to fall to me—”

“When Shopina’s effect is not negated, then her secondary effect activates! Only Light-attribute monsters can use their effects this turn!”

 

The resounding chorus of “ _what?!”_ has never sounded sweeter. “Soprano’s ability activates! I can Fusion Summon a Melodious monster once per turn!”

 

“That’s _sweet_!” one of the boys, Jaden, cries out. Yuzu gets the impression that he’s leaning on the railing of the colosseum.

The Fusion gate acts as a backlight, casting a shadow she’s avoided looking at for too long. “I fuse Soprano from my field and Serenade from my hand! _Fusion Summon! Schubert—the Melodious Maestra!”_ The gate condenses into a pillar, peeling back massive petals of light to reveal Schubert in all her resplendence. “I can banish up to three cards from either player’s Graveyard only once while this card is face up on the field! I banish your Dramatic Rescue, your Amazon Tiger, and my Serenade! Schubert gains 600 attack points!

“Schubert, Shopina— _CANON FIRE!”_


	7. pick a place to die where its high and dry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> bandit keith's duel with joey ft the trigger that formed the cluster!
> 
> WARNINGS: non-explicit but pretty disturbing death and people trying very hard not to think about it. pegasus, being very camp and pretty evil for fun and profit.

\--- ---

 

Kotori, months ago, had spaced out for a moment in literature class. It’s a good thing she came down with a cold later that day, unable to shake the chill of the--

 

Well. Hmm.

 

Either way, it wouldn’t have looked very good on a note home to her family, startling in the middle of an answer about the single free-verse poem in  _ Natsu no Hana _ and sitting down with a startled look and a rapidly paling face. When her teacher asked if she was alright, she shook her head numbly and put her head down on her desk.

 

It was a really vivid hallucination. Maybe she ate something spoiled at lunch? Because the readings for class were very disturbing to begin with, but she can’t believe her intrusive daydream for the day was a man being thrown off a catwalk.

 

The worst part-- besides the screams that had echoed in her head-- is the fact that he locked eyes with her, face desperate and framed by a yellow tattoo and pale hair, as he fell into the reactor fluid.

 

\--- ---

 

She’s reminded of that moment as she looks over the antique duel field into the gaping maw below her and the two duelists with (pale) golden hair. The uncomfortable memory of steam wafting up and burning any skin it touched raises goosebumps.   
  
The duel field landing does not have enough room for the two of them, But Kotori can’t figure out where she can go without endangering herself.   
  
“I’ve had it with these fucking hallucinations,” the boy next to her mutters. “Absolutely fucking had it.” He looks at her and jabs her in the stomach with an elbow, and takes a startled breath when he actually makes contact. “Don’t get in my way, please God. I’ll panic about this later.”   
  
Kotori is not entirely sure she has enough breath or focus to answer him. She shuffles as close to the side of the duelist’s space as possible and tries to not hyperventilate. Something about this moment is bugging her, though, she thinks absently, and then latches onto the thought. Cracking the mystery of this moment might be enough to forget about the ( _ don't think about it, don't think about--)  _ the chasm ( _ darn it _ ) or the ghost of that man, falling and screaming ( _ DAMMIT) _ .

  
  


\--- ---

 

Joey’s hands are clammy as he puts down his deck. He has to jostle by the quiet (thank christ) girl with green hair, and he can’t help but flinch whenever he  _ actually  _ jostles her. It’s like that spikey-headed orange bastard from the boat: someone would have said something about the girl that suddenly appeared, except maybe for Pegasus (because he could be orchestrating this and his smug-fucker attitude would stop him from saying anything to ‘make a joke’), but since nobody has said anything, he assumes that this is, once again, spooky ghost hallucination shit.

 

Bandit Keith takes the first move, and Joey’s sweating already. It doesn’t have anything to do with needing to beat a former US champion for his sister; or Pegasus watching down, waiting for Joey to snap and lose it; and it  _ sure as hell _ isn’t because this pit is reminding him of the terrible dream of the man in the pit--

 

\--Okay, it’s all of those things. Joey’s man enough to admit that.

 

“Kattobingu,” the green-haired girl says. She places a delicate hand over his work-rough one. “This all seems... very intense,” she says slowly. “But I’m sure this will be over soon. Put some faith in yourself.” She shivers. The A/C is a little high, Joey notes, and he’s half a second away from offering her his coat before he remembers that she doesn’t  _ fucking exist. _

 

“Thought I told you not to talk,” he mutters.  He very carefully does not look at her for the rest of the duel, and focuses very firmly on Serenity.

 

\--- ---

 

Kotori doesn’t notice it at first, after the first few monsters shatter into broad strokes, but this Keith fellow keeps holding himself funny. He crosses his arms and rubs at his wrist cuff like they chafe. Yuuma’s done that a few times, when his wrist was still swelled up and he tried to wear his bracelet over his bandages.

 

Why wear wrist cuffs that don’t fit? It’s silly. 

 

Keith summons his Slot Machine monster, and isn’t it funny, that there’s so many cards out there that she’s never heard of? 

 

She misses it the first time, when he draws the first 7 Completed. It’s very convenient for him, but not out of the realm of possibility; she’s seen matches with Yuuma where these kinds of miraculous draws had happened.

 

...And then he does it again. “Odd,” she muses. Bandit Keith fiddles with his cuff again, twisting it to readjust the position. It doesn’t look like it just slips on; there can’t be any difference besides wear, right--   
  


The boy beside her-- she thinks his name is Joey; the boy with the silly hair in the balcony keeps yelling it in encouragement, and their commentary keeps floating down  _ (don't think about it) _ to the stage-- grits his teeth and draws his next card. Kotori ignores the lights on the stage and stares at Keith’s hand movements like a hawk--

 

“Look what I drew, Wheeler,” he crows, and  _ that wasn’t even subtle,  _ he shoved his hand  _ right into his wristband-- _ “my last 7-Completed!”

 

\--- ---    
  


Maximilian can admit (to himself, privately) that his Millennium Eye is, what do the kids call it? Haxx. It’s also very gaudy, which he also (privately) loves. But  _ oh _ , does he get the  _ juiciest  _ news with it.

 

Take this duel, for instance: Maximilian had known from the very beginning that the Prize Bandit Keith was cheating. The surveillance he had set up throughout the island-- marketing purposes, darling; it’s all business-- had shown him strong-arming and threatening children left and right. It’s like a stain on his mind-- he keeps remembering all of the children he’s stolen from as young Joseph keeps doggedly dismantling. (And  _ oh _ , wasn’t that funny! Kaiba-boy has really gotten under that one’s skin; would he fight harder or give up faster if Maximilian pitted him against either Kaiba brother? What a charming idea!)

  
  
  


What he wasn’t expecting was the sudden superimposition of a strange girl over young Joseph and-- even more interesting!-- young Joseph on the outside looking in. What could this mean?

 

“You cheater! I can’t believe--  _ ugh _ ,  _ boys _ \--” the boy’s hands find his hips in a huff. “You literally cheated in the most  _ obvious way possible _ . Did you do this to, to make me  _ angry? _ ” This is fascinating! Perhaps he, like Yuugi-boy, has his own spirit? Maybe he has come into extended contact with another Millennium Item?

 

No, no; this is speculation that will not bear fruit. “You’ll have to explain yourself-- those are some  _ heavy accusations _ to level at a fellow duelist, you know,” he cuts in over Keith’s blustering. This should be amusing!   
  


Young Joseph-- the woman pretending to be young Joseph-- levels a glare at Maximilian. Ooh, feisty! “It’s been--” and here she (they? Hmm) looks down at the turn counter on the player display, “--25 turns. He’s taken... 13 turns, and should have drawn 5 cards in the beginning. So that’s 18 cards out of his deck.”   
  
“Big deal, blondie can do basic math--”   
  
“Oh my God, shut  _ up _ ; I didn’t invite you to speak!”

 

One of the quaint little groupies in the balcony leans in to whisper to Yuugi-boy-- no, that’s the spirit flouncing about the boy. The spirit shakes his head and mutters back. Oh, did young Joseph not  _ tell  _ them? About his new spirit friend? How delicious!   
  
(This is  _ exactly  _ what he means about the juiciest news.)   
  


“So he turns up with three 7-Completed--  _ in a row,  _ you are  _ not subtle _ \-- which means that he either stacked the deck and drew all three at a predetermined spot,  _ or _ \--” she stabs a finger at him from across the field and  _ god,  _ is Maximilian so glad to have a wine cooler on hand for this-- “ _ or,  _ you pulled them out of your  _ stupid, tacky cuff!!” _

 

She’s right on the money, too-- it is very tacky. Maximilian almost banned him on principle if he didn't think that if would be funny to humiliate him again.

 

“18, 17, 16 cards out of the deck; say you had 40 cards. You have 3, then 2, then 1 out of... 24, 23, 22 cards. I don’t know about you, but I’m clocking in 6 over 8000, before I even think about the other little digits at the bottom, to draw all three cards in a row.  _ Those are not good odds. _ ”

 

The audience hasn’t stopped tittering, and Maximilian can’t understand why-- it’s solid mental math, even if the odds are closer to 6 to 12,000, but understands when the pointy-haired one who is not Yuugi-boy calls out something about young Joseph having abyssmal skills in mathematics. She blew their cover, then! Plot twist after plot twist, it seems!

 

The Prize Bandit’s face crumples in rage. “You didn’t even have the entry card, you stupid bastard! You were the one who cheated first!” Oh,  _ dear _ , has poor Keithy lost his touch!   
  
The young girl freezes for just a moment-- enough for the shock of being called out like a toddler to force the girl out and let the boy shakily reassert himself. (Was this his first time being taken over? Does he remember it? Was he  _ aware? _ Pegasus takes another sip of wine and wishes he had his favorite herbed sheep cheese and a plate of crostinis. This is turning into such fantastic drama; it’d be a shame to have subpar snacks for it.)

 

“He’s right: I lost my card somehow. But tell me, how would  _ you  _ know that, Bandit Keith?” Young Joseph makes a marvelous show of bravado. “I’m  _ all ears. _ ”

 

\--- ---


End file.
